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Thursday, March 2, 2017

The Brand New Testament (March 3rd and 5th at the Cleveland Cinematheque)

[THE BRAND NEW
TESTAMENT screens Friday March 3rd at 9:00 pm and Sunday March 5th at 4:00
pm at the Cleveland Cinematheque.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

Directed and co-written by Jaco Van Dormael, THE BRAND NEW
TESTAMENT wastes no time announcing its sacrilegious intentions. It begins
with God's 10-year-old daughter, Ea (Pili Groyne), informing us via narration that
once she added her 6 apostles to her brother's 12, the world became a better
place. "God exists," she explains. "He lives in Brussels. He's a
bastard, he's horrible to his wife and daughter." So yeah, it's safe to
say some viewers will be offended.

The plot is set in motion when Ea runs away from home after
being tipped to a secret escape route by her brother JC. Before leaving home,
though, Ea decided to throw a serious monkey wrench into dad's creation by
texting everyone the exact amount of time they have left to live. As you can
imagine, this has major ramifications.

God, played by Benoît Poelvoorde as the Belgian equivalent
of some beer-swilling, tank top-wearing trailer park denizen you might see on
'Cops', is furious. So he follows Ea to earth, leaving Mrs. God (Yolande Moreau)
behind to contemplate her baseball card collection.

Ea begins assembling her followers, starting with a homeless
guy (Marco Lorenzini) she enlists as her official scribe. As for the disciples
proper, they consist of a beautiful, lonely one-armed woman (Laura Verlinden),
an older guy who once dreamed of being an explorer but wound up an office drone
instead (Didier De Neck), a pervy guy who decides to spend his remaining days
on earth at nudie booths (Serge Lariviere), a man with homicidal tendencies who
figures he can finally give in to them because he won't be able to kill anyone
who isn't supposed to die, anyway (Francois Damiens), a woman who leaves her
husband for a gorilla (Catherine Deneuve, her talents kind of wasted here in a
small part), and a young boy who decides he wants to spend his last few weeks
as a girl (Romain Gelin).

And yet, despite its edgy premise, in many ways TESTAMENT isn't all that far off from
such examples of treacly Hollywood magical realism as BRUCE ALMIGHTY or BIG FISH.
Sure, it heaps considerable scorn on patriarchal religions, and if that bothers
you, you might want to steer clear. But when it comes to humanity, the film
takes a mostly sunny view. Ultimately, the central theme seems to be that we'd
all be ok if we just got a little more in touch with the feminine side of the
divine. Controversial in our modern western society, perhaps, but the way the
movie handles it is hardly biting.

Still, there are some laughs to be had, Groyne makes for a
likeable lead, and Moreau is enjoyably grumpy as the misanthropic deity. The film seems to think it's making a bolder
statement than it really is, and it's probably a bit too long, but overall,
it's good blasphemous fun. 3 out of 4 stars.